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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26855077">In the dark</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellofthetolppl/pseuds/bellofthetolppl'>bellofthetolppl</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The 100 (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Anxiety, Depression, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, Post-Season/Series 02, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 17:13:35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>7,441</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26855077</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellofthetolppl/pseuds/bellofthetolppl</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>This was a prompt I got on tumblr that goes like this: <em>Heyy!! I really love reading your work with how Bellamy deals with mental health issues (like depression or anxiety) I was wondering if you could also write something with Bell dealing with ADHD? Much love either way </em></p><p>I didnt' write about ADHD cause there's already a fic like that so instead I wrote another depression fic. </p><p>This is post season 2 where Bellamy is dealing with everything that happened in Mount Weather. He thinks he's all alone with Clarke and Octavia gone but his friends fight for him.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>42</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>In the dark</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>A/N: Hope you'll enjoy this as painful as it is! Comments and kudos are much appreciated.</p><p>You can find me on Tumblr @bellamyblake!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p></p><div class="">
  <p>It doesn’t happen right away-there’s a feeling of heaviness in his bones from the moment he leaves Mount Weather. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>At first he thinks it’s just because it’s an eight hour long treck after not sleeping for over two days, half the delinquents are on stretchers which worries the hell out of him but he feels broken and like he suddenly has no strength and he has no explanation for it.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It only gets worse when Clarke leaves him by the gates, putting a burden that weights him to the ground and leaves him breathless.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>After, he goes through Arkadia in a daze, like he’s not really there and when he ends up in a room that he doesn’t even know if it belongs to him or anyone he knows, he collapses on the floor and suddenly he can’t breathe.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He curls up on his own and thinks that he’s just in shock-that’s it, they commited genocide, Clarke left, his friends are hurt and he has to take care of them, keep going. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>Yeah that was it.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He somehow makes it back on his feet, goes outside not realizing that evening settled and upon seeing one of the guards he asks them where the showers are. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>When he takes off his clothes and cleans himself up it does absolutely nothing to take the feeling of his hands being stained with blood away.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He rubs them for fifteen minutes and by the end it feels like his skin is peeling.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>There are scars and bruises on his back and ribs and he finds out that first night that when he drags his fingers over them, he enjoys the pain, welcomes it because it’s something tangible, something real, that he can actually feel.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>He doesn’t sleep that night.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>Or the next one.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>Or the one after that.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He volunteers for a place in the guards, the hunting team and the construction group right away, deciding that if he fills his days with as much work as he can, he won’t have to constantly think about bodies piled up in his feet, little boys asking for their fathers or those blue eyes that left him alone.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And every evening he goes by medbay to check on the delinquents recovering from their injuries.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It hurts him to do it because though they are grateful he does see the trace of fear in their eyes-he did commit genocide after all, it was for them, but it was one of the most awful acts someone can do. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Maybe Clarke was right to leave, maybe...he thinks through his lonely anger that is a dull ache in his chest, maybe this is for the better. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>He doesn’t wish for her to see this, he doesn’t want that pain on her too.</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His sister can’t spare a look at him, though, it’s the worst with her. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She talks to him, asks him questions and greets him morning and night but her eyes never land on his. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She’s angry too, he knows she is, because he did do this for her again and in the end she never asked him to. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>But he doesn’t say anything and he just takes it, though it hurts like nothing else that every night around the camp fire when he and the other delinquents are eating dinner, she can’t wait to be done with her bowl and jump on her feet, leaving him behind.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>So he stops going there.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>He doesn’t feel like eating anyway. </em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The kids start getting better in just a few weeks and he doesn’t need to go to medbay. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He still keeps an eye on them, though-he gives his extra ration to Harper who’s too weak and needs more food, throws a blanket over Jasper’s drunk figure and carries him inside the Ark every night after he spends hours looking for the place he passed out at and he asks Raven to work with Monty on wiring the expanding fence because he knows the kid needs to think about something other than blood too.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>He walks through camp like a ghost though.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Barely talks to anyone, barely speaks when someone asks him something.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He just does things now, like a robot-wakes up, goes hunting then joins the construction site, then takes a guard shift, then to his room where he just lies  and doesn’t sleep.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He can’t manage a full hour, it’s fifteen minutes there, twenty here, he wakes up all the time and tries over for a few hours before he gives up and gets to the bar where he takes a drink. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Then another and then a few more.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His feet are wobbly on his way back to his room but it does nothing to help him fall asleep.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He thinks they start to notice but they are too afraid to approach him-Monty casually asks him if he wants to join them for dinner and Harper brings by a sweater she dug out for him from a pile somewhere (probably Mount Weahter if he had to guess, which is why he doesn’t touch it) and Miller tries to start a conversation during their guard shift.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>But he doesn’t say anything back, he waves them off, mumbles a short quiet <em>I’m fine</em> and when at night he wakes up screaming and has another attack that leaves him unable to breathe for more than fifteen minutes, he just takes it.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>Because he thinks he deserves it.</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He loses weight and he doesn’t notice it until one morning he tries to tie the belt on his cargo pants and he can’t find a hole after the last one. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>There’s a bruise on his side that he doesn’t remember getting but then again he did fall out of bed last night and hit the floor hard so maybe it was that? </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Or maybe it was him passing out the day before that when he got back from his guard shift? </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It wasn’t the first time, wouldn’t be the last.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He gets weaker with each day, truly becomes a ghost-the hallowness of his cheeks, the circles under his eyes, he knows they scare the kids, so he avoids them even more.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He gets a stubble and his hair grows out but he doesn’t even register that.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>All he thinks about is a pile of bodies, the blood on his hands and that he can’t fucking breathe.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>But also that he’s really damn tired.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>On an early summer July morning Kane comes to look for him by the wall and tells him Octavia wants to talk to him. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy stumbles on his feet and falls on his knees almost stabbing himself with his own knife strapped to his belt in the process. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Hey, are you alright?” he asks and Bellamy can’t remember the last time someone asked him that. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Fine.” he grumbles.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He can’t recognize his own voice.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“No, you’re not.” Kane’s been up on him for quite some time now, sending guards to switch with him if Bellamy overworked himself and trying to take him off the construction team because he fell off the roof of a cabin they were building a few weeks back. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Nothing happened to him, the ground cushioned his body, the grass being too high for the peak of the summer wrapped him up like a baby in a soft blanket. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>There were some bruises on his back and his side did still hurt but he refused to go to medical.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>That night when he came home, after his panic attack when he finally could catch his breath he remembered it and laughed. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>He couldn’t even </em>
    <strong>
      <em>die</em>
    </strong>
    <em> properly. </em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy pushes through Kane and finds his sister on the edge of camp nursing to the horses.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She hears him but doesn’t turn around as she keeps brushing Helious’ mane.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“We’re leaving tomorrow.” she announces “Lincoln and I-we’re going to the sea. To Luna.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He stays there dumbfounded, feels the rise of another panic attack and recognizes that his sister turns around and talks to him, asks him something then gets angry when he doesn’t say anything back and before he knows what’s happening-because his ears are ringing and he tastes blood in his mouth, she drops the brush in the bucket nearby and storms off.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>The next day he doesn’t get out of bed.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>He tries to but he can’t. Physically he can’t.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him but he knows he can’t make himself move. It’s been hard to get up since they got back home but now it’s impossible.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>So he just stays there, he closes his eyes and sleeps, then wakes up, has a panic attack, sleeps again, loses complete track of time.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The worst thing is that nobody comes that first day.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>Nobody looks for him.</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He does end up trying to get up but he’s so weak on his feet that he falls on the ground, feels his ribs crack, then passes out, maybe he hits his head too he doesn’t know. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>When he wakes up again judging by the light coming from the window, it’s another day and he still can’t make his tired bones move.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Then other hands come too. Hands that touch him and raise him up, gentle hands, soft hands, cold hands-those must be Jasper’s he thinks and small hands that remind him of Clarke but he knows she can’t be there.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She was gone after all.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Someone carries him and puts him back to bed, there are voices that he can’t make out, thinks that he hears Abby though and was that...Kane? </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>There’s something wet coming down his face and he figures it must be blood because when he tries to open his eyes all he sees is red.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>When they try to undress him, though, that’s when he starts struggling. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He doesn’t want them to see his scars from the mountain, the bruises, the burns from crawing down the vents trying to escape a hellfire. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Burns he never threated but let burn, blister and pop, ooze blood and yellow for weeks after they came home.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He’s too weak, though, he can’t fight the hands as much as he tries to. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They pull his shirt off, there’s something pressed to his head-was it a cloth? A bandage? </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He doesn’t know but when they touch his ribs he whines, the pain comes shocking him back to reality and for a moment he does recognize the faces leaning over him and he can see Abby, Kane, Monty and Miller.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Hey, it’s okay, you’ll be fine.” they say but he just smiles.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He smiles like Jasper did when they went out on that mission and the Azgeda warrior pressed the blade to his neck.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And then he waves his hand, because he can’t speak but what he is so desperate to say is.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>“Don’t bother.”</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He’s not worth it. Never was.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And yet they do. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>For some reason, god knows for what or why, they do bother. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He feels a pinch in his neck and soon enough his eyes are drooping and he falls asleep. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It’s different this time, not as dark, he feels light like he’s floating and he still has the dreams about the children dead in his feet and he still sees all the blood and grime of the mountain and Maya’s burned face but there are other things too-still painful but...somewhat different.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He dreams of him and O as children. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He’s ten, she’s two and strapped to his chest while he goes around the house and washes her clothes in the dirty sink in their small bathroom-she’s cooing and reaching for him and he’s kissing her fingers and shushing her. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Then he’s twelve and he’s sick, O is too, they’re lying in their mom’s cot together and she’s looking down at them-she’s scared. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He knows she worries about O more, she gave her all the medicine prescribed to him and he is fine with it. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>In all honesty, he doesn’t care about himself either but he sees the worried brow on her forehead and the way she cups his cheek and talks to him “My boy” she whispers leaning over and kissing his forehead “Always so brave.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And then he wakes up. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It’s another day and he can’t make out the people around him at all at first. He knows someone’s sitting on a chair next to his bed but for some reason his vision’s blurry.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>No matter how much tries to blink the sleepiness away, he can’t make out the figures-it’s one big blurpy spot like when he was little and he got bullied at school because a boy called his mom a slut and they got into a fight in which he was pushed to the wall and hurt his head bad.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Kane!” </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It’s Jasper, Bellamy thinks and he does sound strangely sober.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I think he’s awake.” excitement in his voice. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Why? How long has he been asleep?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Another figure joins in and he rolls around with a groan reaching to touch his head but another hand stops him.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Don’t!” they pull it off “You’re hurt.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Kane...that must be Kane. He always wanted to protect him. To save him.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Didn’t he know he was beyond saving?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He keeps blinking away and finally he does make the two figures somewhat though they’re still blurry. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>As he looks around he finds himself still in his room, lying in his bed, covered by a thick blanket. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His shirt feels drenched with sweat though and he hates it but his eyes fall on the IV coming out from his arm and his eyes follow the small tube near the bed where he finds a blood bag hanging from a makeshift stand nearby. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Hey, you’re okay now.” Kane tells him, sitting by the bed and rubbing his thumb over his hand in a soothing manner because Bellamy was already somewhat panicking, his breaths coming in harsh and ragged. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“It’s fine, we patched you up. Abby hooked you to an IV because you lost a lot of blood before we found you.” Too much information, he thinks, but he does try to process it.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“You fell hard, hit your head and your side. Abby says you have a concussion.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>All Bellamy manages is a groan, his head is hurting him so bad it feels like it’s splitting in two and so he closes his eyes again instead and he kind of wants to succumb into the darkness again.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Do you think he gets what you’re saying?” he hears Jasper’s worried voice.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I’m not sure. You should go get Abby and bring him something to eat from mess hall. Maybe soup if they have any.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“On it.” then there’s a pause and Bellamy feels Jasper’s bony cold fingers on his shoudler. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He almost shrugs out of fear, he didn’t like being touched anymore and Kane’s hand on his made his skin crawl but he is also too tired to fight it. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The best he can do to express that discomfort is let his face twist in pain but he doubts they notice anyway. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Hang on, man.” he tells quietly “Don’t you give up on us.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p><em>Funny thing coming from you</em>, Bellamy thinks but keeps his eyes closed.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Some time passes, he doesn’t know how much because he drifts off again-somehow sleeping comes easier to him now and he feels like he’s drowning but not in a bad way-it’s as if something is pulling him down-there’s the heaviness of his bones being too tired and his mind being completely empty. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It’s not too bad and he finds that he prefers it now even if there are still nightmares when he sleeps.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>But hands pull at him again and bring him back to consciousness which makes him unhappy and the voices resurface but now it’s not just Kane or Jasper-there’s someone else too-Abby. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Her voice makes him think of Clarke, he almost slips into the idea that she’s there but when he briefly opens his eyes and doesn’t see a flash of golden blond hair he closes them again and groans, trying to roll over to his side and turn his back to them, though unsuccessfuly. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Even the barest of movements make it seem like he’s moving tons, not his limbs.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“He’s awake?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I think so. He closed his eyes but his breathing’s shallow so he must be.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“We need to wake him, I have to take a look at him, make him eat.” Abby, that must be her, she has that thinge of mother worry in her voice, like Aurora once did when O got hurt or sick. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>A hand on his face, a smaller colder one makes him shiver and move his head away with a groan.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Hey, Bellamy, can you please open your eyes?” she asks and he complies albeit unwillingly.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She’s leaning over him, there’s a stethoscope hanging from her neck and surgical blue gloves with which she touches him. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Kane’s by his feet sitting on the edge of the bed, looking at him with worry-he’s rarely seen the man so pale and tired no matter the problem of the day that needed solving.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy and Clarke had looked like that once too, back at the dropship when they skipped meals and woke up early to get on with solving whatever needed to be solved for the day.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Hey, welcome back.” she tells him and there’s that motherly softness in her features and voice again. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Do you know where you are?” he can’t speak, he tries to but somehow he just doesn’t want to so he gives up and manages a slow nod that makes his head feel like it’d explode. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Good, don’t push yourself too hard okay? You’re concussed so I just have to ask you a few questions and take a look at you.” he groans again but manages another nod. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She picks up a light from her backpocket and flashes it in his eyes as she keeps talking.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Do you know where you are?” he nods again as she leaves the light and takes off her stethoscope quickly sneaking it under his drenched shirt and pressing it to his chest. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He shivers, tries to pull away but her other hand keeps him still by the shoulder.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p> “Can you try and talk?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“My room.” he manages but it’s so barely audible and requires so much strength that he already hates it. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She smiles in support, happy with his answer, though.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Do you know what the date is?”he shakes his head and Kane bites his lips.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“He has been asleep for a few days, Abby.” he kindly reminds her while she focuses on listening to his breathing and heartbeat. Her hands push his shirt up and she checks the bandages around his ribs.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“What about the month?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“August.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“How old are you?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Twenty-four.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I thought you’re twenty-three” Kane prods and Bellamy feels like laughing again but he just doesn’t have the strength to.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“My birthday was...a few weeks ago.” nobody remembered. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Not even Octavia. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He himself had forgotten all about it and only recalled it later that same day when he was taking a drink at the bar after his shift. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Abby stops whatever she’s doing and looks at him, her look filled with something resembling pity which he hates so he closes his eyes again-he doesn’t want that, any of that-them being here, worrying over him. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>There’s no point.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He wishes he had the strength to tell them so now.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>But he doesn’t.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>So instead he just wants to succumb back to his sleep-like state.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Hey, stay with me, please.” Abby pats his cheek again when he starts drifting off. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>All he really needed was to close his eyes and he’d start falling-maybe all the months of endless insomnia were finally catching up with him. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He obliges her, he doesn’t know why but he still feels sleepy so he keeps his eyes half-opened while they talk.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Let’s change his shirt, he’s soaking wet.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Is he alright?” Kane asks and Abby doesn’t answer-just purses her lips and gives Kane one of <strong><em>those </em></strong>looks that meant no, but I don’t want to say it out loud in front of him.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Help me raise him up.” she orders instead and Kane stands up and comes by her side, taking his arms and carefully pulling him up, but quickly sitting behind him for support and letting his back fall on his chest, half slumped to his lap. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy groans from the pain they cause him-his head does feel like it’d explode and he reaches to touch it again, mindlessly almost and this time no one stops him so he feels the bandage wrapped around it-it’s a lot bigger than he thought it’d be and it feels soaked too, probably with some blood.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Kane pulls his hand off of it and scolds him gently when he figures that he’s trying to undo it.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He must be a pretty ugly picture because he hears Kane suck in his breath upon seeing his body and the reaction actually makes him look at his own torso too only to find it disgusting as well.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The ribs that weren’t patched up were sticking out, he had shrunk on himself-he had never truly gained weight through his entire twenty four years of miserable existance but now it looked really bad.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And to make it worse there were the scars from his burns in the Mountain and the bruises covering places he hadn’t known he even hurt himself.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He turned his head away, he couldn’t look at himself. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He was disgusted not just by what he was carrying inside-his body was a marred ugly mess of scars and bones-he had truly taken the shape of a monster.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>So instead he leans his head on Kane’s chest and tries to calm himself down upon feeling another anxiety attack wash over him. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Abby changes the bandage on his ribs and then reaches for the one on his head.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“How bad is the pain?” she asks him when she pats his cheek again trying to bring him back to consciousness. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He shrugs a little but the motion itself makes him wince. It hurts a lot and she can tell if the way her eyebrows furrow upon his dismissal are anything to go by. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His eyesight gets blurry again and his head feels like it’s too heavy for him to hold so he leans back searching for Kane’s chest as support.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Abby puts her hand on his neck, though and pulls him up, staring at his eyes again.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I’m sorry, I have to change this. I know it hurts but I need to.” he doesn’t even try to manage a nod, being too tired and disoriented. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He succumbs to a different type of being unaware of his surroundings-it’s again a dream like state but he’s aware they are there yet he’s not entirely coherent so it’s a weird feeling where he can open his eyes and see them but not process anything that’s happening.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They talk, he hears them talk, some of the words he makes out.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“When will it get better?” that must be Kane.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“With a conscussion as bad as this one it will be weeks until he stops hurting.” a sigh, then her hands wrapping a clean bandage over his head, not too tight or too loose which Bellamy finds himself grateful for </em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“That’s not what I’m worried about, though.”</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Then more movement, they shrug a shirt over him, he groans again but keeps his eyes closed. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>There’s a dream that appears before him-he’s in the fields by the dropship but they look different-no mud or fires, skeletons of dead grounders or blood pooling in the piddles-it’s nice and green, there are flowers even, the sun is shining down on him and he looks up at it, the warmth of the reys making him smile and close his eyes.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“Bellamy!” he hears someone call but he doesn’t want it to end right away. Then a hand on his, squeezing it hard, a cold and tiny hand “Bellamy, open your eyes.”</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>“Clarke?”</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He’s roughly brought back to reality and when he opens his eyes he sees Monty made an appearance too and that he’s holding out a tray of food.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Sorry, it’s just us.” Jasper chimes in behind him, leaning on the bed board by his feet. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He looks around and finds himself still half slumped on Kane’s body. Abby’s taking off her gloves in a seemingly angry manner. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Did he do something to annoy them when he passed out?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Or was it that he said <strong><em>her</em></strong> name?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Come on, he has to eat.” she orders and Monty carefully puts the trey by his side and picks up the bowl of something that looks like soup. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“It’s okay, Monty, I’ll do it.” Abby says softly and the kid moves back but both him and Jasper stay and circle around to the other side of his bed even though the space there is smaller as it borders with the wall behind them.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They still sit down on the cold floor and lean their backs on the wall, smiling at him but he recognizes the worry in their eyes and suddenly he feels bad that they’re there, worrying over a lost cause like him, taking care of someone who did not deserve it. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jasper lost the love of his life because of him, Monty got ruined because he and Clarke had to pull a lever and commit genocide.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They shouldn’t be here.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He closes his eyes and just then feels Abby press the spoon to his lips.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He pulls his head to the other side and fights against Kane’s body for the first time that day.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Come on now, don’t be stubborn!” Abby scolds mildly and he opens his eyes but his lips stay pursed. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He probably looks like a grumpy five year old who’s refusing to eat his dinner but he doesn’t care. He won’t do that.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It had to end.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He had to put an end to it.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And relieve them all of their suffering and worry.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Once he’s gone it’d be easier. For him and for them.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Bellamy!” Kane joins in when he pushes his head in the other direction once Abby tries to bring the spoon to his lips again. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He groans, struggles against him. He hears the kids move too, get up, worry over him.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Bell, come on man, don’t be like that!” Jasper, that sounds like him.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>But he just tosses and turns even though his body hurts and then he tries to pull away from Kane and Abby but he ends up hitting the bowl with his flailing hand and letting it all spill over her and the bed.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He almost feels bad.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Almost.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“What the hell!” Jasper sounds angry. He never did sound angry for things like this before. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“What are you doing? Stop this, kid, come on!” Kane tries too but he just shrugs him off and finally he is strong enought to slump out of his arms and roll over to his side.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The side where Jasper and Monty are.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He can’t bear their scared looks so he just closes his eyes and curls up on himself.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Bellamy-”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Let him be.” Jasper says “He won’t do it. Not like that.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“He needs to eat. He’s severely dyhadrated and he-”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“You can’t force him.” Jasper says feverntly “And you shouldn’t!”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“So what, we just let him die? Is that your idea?” Monty contradicts his best friend.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“No, we convince him that he has to, we fight for him but we don’t fucking force it on him!”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy wants to cover his ears and stop listening, he can already feel the burden of their worried voices on his consciousness and he tries to move his hand to his head and just hide, curl up, disappear.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They keep arguing above him though and he drowns it out.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>All he wants is to go back to that field, to the dropship, feel the sun again.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Just go.” he whispers and they don’t hear him, not at first at least “Just leave me.” he repeats it over and over and over again until they <strong><em>do</em></strong> hear him, it’s Monty who notices it and he who makes them stop talking. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They quiet down and he wraps his arms around his head, hiding in on himself, eyes closed.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The others stop talking and the only sound that could be heard in the room is his own incessant endlessly stubborn repeat of the same thing.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p><strong><em>“Let me go. Just leave me alone. Leave me...let me...let me go. Just let me go.” </em></strong>over and over and over like a mantra.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>A mantra of death.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The sentences become words instead. Just words.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p><em>“Alone...go...leave..”</em> he keeps mumbling. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He doesn’t know when he starts crying, but he does feel the tears coming down his face and they do soak the pillow. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It hurts. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It hurt so much that he couldn’t breathe-all the pain comes back crashing in, hitting his body like a wave clashing with the rocks on the shore-you knew it was there, but you were desperately trying to outrun it and then it still caught up with you.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His pain, Bellamy knew, would always catch up with him. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It’d always crash in his back and trip him over, force him to tumble in the waves and drown drown drown until he couldn’t breathe.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And then inevitably he’d be pulled up for this one awful moment that seems blissful in which he’d take the precious inhale that’s enough to keep him alive for just a moment, an hour, a day longer before he drowned again.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He didn’t want that precious inhale.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He didn’t want air anymore.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He just wanted it to end.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He feels his throat tighten, his chest get heavy.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“He can’t breathe!” someone yells above him.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“He’s having a panick attack!”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>He lets their voices mix with the universal buzz above him while pictures change before his eyes-Roma dead in the forest, Mbege’s body lying on the ground, the grounders attacking them, the empty ship, Clarke...his beautiful Clarke running to him hugging him, then her crying with Finn’s body strapped to a pole, hanging loosely. </em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>And then a mountain of concrete, fires, burns, little boys looking up at him asking about the ground-</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>the smell of blood, smoak, decaying bodies.</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>Red, red, red.</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>Too much red.</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Then something else happens.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He feels another body next to him, laying down, wrapping their arm around his middle and pulling him to their chest. They hold him tight and shush him, beg him to breathe.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Then antoher body on his other side, they take his hands in theirs and hold onto him, intertwine his fingers with theirs and talk, just talk, words that mean nothing to Bellamy at first until he ultimately gets pulled back for air.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He tries to fight it.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He doesn’t want to, it hurts, it just goddamn hurts. He wants it all to stop.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>But the voices begged.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Please, Bellamy, please, just breathe.” and “Come on, man, don’t give up on us now. We need you.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>And he hears another voice in his head too-his mother’s and she appears before him from a light-a warm nice yellow light like the sun reys that he saw before in the dropship.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>Her hand cups his cheek and she smiles.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“My boy” she tells him.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“Mama?” he whispers, feeling his lungs relax somewhat, his breath return to him.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“Hold on, my boy. Don’t give up.” her thumb rubs under his eye.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“It hurts.” he ends up uttering and he must be saying it out loud because the people holding him form both sides tighten their grip on him. “I can’t...anymore.”</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“Yes you can.” she tells him and her voice sounds weird, not truly like Aurora’s but he doesn’t want to open up his eyes and find someone else there before him. </em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>He just wants her. His mom.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“I hurt everyone.”</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“No, you saved everyone.” he shakes his head but she puts both her hands on his face and looks at him “I know it’s hard, I know it’s painful, but you can’t give up. You have so much more to live, my boy.”</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“What if I don’t want to? What if all there is is pain?”</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“No it’s not.” she says stubbornly but he shakes his head at her in disbelief “It’s not! Feel it-” she tells him “Feel your friends holding you, feel their love and their fear of losing you-you’re not alone.” she tells him “You’re never alone.”</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>He closes his eyes and hears as Monty and Jasper keep talking to him, whispering things, Abby and Kane are in the far distance too. They’re there, his mom is right-he’s not alone.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>Clarke may have left. His sister too-they may be gone but he still had everyone else. And if they were here then they cared even if he didn’t deserve it.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>“You can breathe now.” his mom tells him when she pulls his forehead closer and kisses it “Just breathe.”</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He wakes up, althought unwillingly and finds Monty staring at him with eyes glassy and worried, hands intertwined in his own, then he feels Jasper’s breath on him and his wiry arms holding his middle over his bruised ribs that hurt but somehow not too horribly right now.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“There you go.” Monty says and a smile spreads over his face and he throws Jasper a look.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Is he back?” Jasper leans over and looks at Bellamy. “Hey, man. You scared us.” Bellamy bows his head down shyly. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Sorry.” is all he manages before closing his eyes again.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“It’s okay. Don’t worry about it.” Monty promises “We’re here for you.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“You’ll stay?” he asks carefully, still refusing to open his eyes and meet their worried faces.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“We’re not going anywhere.” Jasper promises and they just stay like this, wrapping him up from both sides.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy lets himself succumb into the calmness of the sea, drown in their voices as the kids spoke, argued in their childish manner, even joked about. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Kane and Abby are there too, they throw another blanket over them because Bellamy’s still shaking from his terrors. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He feels Abby’s motherly hand tuck it in behind his back and stroke his head.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It doesn’t magically get better after that.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The next morning he still wakes up with clothes drenched, barely breathing, crying and soaking the pillow.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Monty’s there, though, sitting on a chair next to him. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He jumps when Bellamy wakes up with a start and holds his hand. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Then he patiently waits until his breathing calms down and when it does he helps him take a few sips of water and change his shirt which is funny on it’s own because Bellamy’s still despite his current state, heavy and Monty is a wirey skinny kid. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>When Bellamy rolls to his side, the bad one, just to feel some pain and hold onto something tangible Monty asks him what he wants to do? If something would help him feel better even if for a few minutes?</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy still barely talks but his eyes land on the dirty yellow book placed on the shelf above Monty’s head and the kid follows his eyes and smiles.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He reads to him for hours. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Then he falls asleep and wakes up to Harper who’s sweet face and soft eyes coax him into taking a few spoons of the soup Kane brings at noon.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He’s not hungry and it’s still hard to move, like at all so he doesn’t, but he’s there and so are they and it is somewhat bearable even when he still has panic attacks or nigthmares.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>There’s the guilt there as well-that he’s bothering them with this, that they have to take care of him and worry over him but all of them, his closest friends who come by, see and recognize this in his eyes and make sure to push it all away.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He loves them all and their visits bring something different with them that makes it easier to breathe somehow.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Miller acts like nothing is wrong at all with Bellamy and talks about joining Monty for a patrol run outside the gates and how they found this weird flower that he thought would look nice in his hair. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Harper is soft and quiet, she is very good at convincing him to eat half of his soup or try at least the bread if he doesn’t want anything else and she even gets him to sit up and cuts his hair which is a painful affair for his head and ribs but he does it just to see her smile. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jasper doesn’t come all the time because he has dark days of his own but when he does he’s chippery and loud and everything about being young. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Monty, Bellamy likes the best because he doesn’t push too much but he’s always there-he reads to him and then when he gets tired he talks to Bellamy about his garden, the one he started in the south fields of Arkadia that the new truce with the grounders secured. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“You have to see it man, it’s not too big but it’s lovely. There was just ground there at first but now that the beans have started coming out and the potatoes...I didn’t know the potatoes bloomed so nicely, I think you’ll like it.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy looks up at him like a kid staring up at his parents with hope.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Maybe one day I can show you.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He shrugs on his own, curls up back on the bed. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He hasn’t been out since he fell, that was almost three weeks now. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His head was better but it still hurt and his ribs were starting to heal but it wasn’t that. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It was never about that anyway.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“No pressure, though.” Monty assures and squeezes his wrist giving him a light smile “Now where were we?” he gets back to reading <em>The Iliad</em> and Bellamy closes his eyes, letting his body rest again.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>One morning a few days after that he wakes up and it feels a little easier to breathe. He manages to sit up on his own though he’s very weak and wobbly and for the first time in forever he makes it to the bathroom without any help.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The motion alone leaves him tired and he collapses back in bed after barely making it there.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>But when Harper comes along this afternoon he raises himself up on the pillows.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Can you...help me shave?” he asks shyly, head bowed down, ears turning red. She’s so stunned at first that she doesn’t say anything and he hurries to explain. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I’d do it myself but my hands...shake too much.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She takes the few steps she needs to get to him form the door and takes his hands in hers. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I’ve been itching to get rid of this thing and had a plan to remove it while you slept for weeks now.” he chuckles, it’s the first time he laughs since ...he can’t remember how long. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Harper joins in too and soon enough she brings a warm bowl of water and a sharp razor.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>When Miller comes by that night, Kane trailing behind him with the food, they stop by the door utterly surprised and Kane almost spills the soup.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>But then they play it off and Bellamy’s glad that they don’t focus too much on these changes, they act normal around him which is nice and they don’t push him too hard but let him do stuff at his own pace.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Two weeks later, he asks Monty to take him to the gardens.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It’s very slow going and once he’s there he practically spends his time sitting on the ground, hands buried in the grass and just watching as Monty goes around and explains which plant is what.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It’s another month because he’s stable enough to join in around and help him.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>By the end of September they dig out the first potatoes. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Bellamy’s wearing green cargo pants and pale brown shirt as he kneels in the ground taking them out of the hole Monty did with the mattock that was Raven’s most recent creation . </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He’s barefoot, he likes the soil against his heels and in between his toes so much that he forgets to wash them sometimes and goes to bed bearing earth in his sheets.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He finds that he doesn’t care as long as that is what he wants to feel instead of the pain of burns peeling off his skin.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His hands still shake, they did that almost all the time now. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He has the tendency to drop his cup while drinking and making a mess in the midst of their table in the big dining hall or lose a grip of his spoon while he eats soup with his friends at noon but none of them care or mind.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Miller simply leans down and takes it for him, blows a few times and rubs it in his shirt before handing it over while he tells Harper about the new medbay construction plans and Jasper wipes at the table and goes to grab him another cup of water while Harper cleans the glasses on the floor completely unabashed.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He still can’t sleep and he still gets nightmares. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Some days, he can’t get up at all and won’t eat, but he’s gained some of his weight back and he loves working out in the gardens, helping Monty. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They’ve done a lot of progress and he has found himself talk to the plants or the bees he sees between them or the butterflies that remind him of his sister and the birds that perch up on the branches near them.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Sometimes he cries thinking of all the people that died by his hands and with his tears he waters the ground beneath.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Sometimes he looks up at the horizon when they’re on their way home and by the gates and he hopes to see a flash of blond hair but he never does and the hole in his heart aches.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Some of those are too small-” Monty says when Bellamy takes them out and puts them in the bucket nearby. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His friend is wearing overalls, a plaid shirt and a red bandana around his neck. Harper told him he looked like a cowboy from one of those old movies but Bellamy knows Miller finds it not just endearing but hot too.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“They’d be nice for boiling.” Bellamy comments.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“You’re right, maybe we can use some of the rosemary Abby and Kane brought from Polis last week.” Bellamy humms and keeps his work, meticiously taking the potatoes out before moving to the next hole Monty made. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They worked great together like that-Bellamy couldn’t stay up for long but Monty had no problems with it. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>One day, Bellamy thought, he’d be able to do harder work again. He just had to get his strength back.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I’m going down the row over here and-” he suddenly stopped and Bellamy wondered why but kept digging out the potatoes.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“What’s up?” he asked but his voice was still weak and too quiet so he isn’t sure if it carries away. “Monty, what is-” he turns around and he sees his friend standing still, bucket full of potatoes in hand staring at a figure in the horizon.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It takes him a moment to fully turn around without it feeling like it’s too much effort.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Bellamy, get over here.” Monty insists.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He stands up, the ground is soft underneath his feet, it calms him somewhat but his friend’s voice scares him too, he staggers out of fear and anxiety but hobbles over, reaching to lean over on the spikes they put for the tomatoes to wrap around.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Monty, I-”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And then he looks up.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>And he sees her.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She’s standing there just at the edge of the field, dressed in grounder clothes, with a leather bag thrown over her shoulder, her hair is long, too long, tied in many braids with pinkish endings and there’s a scar under her eye that looks like the crescend moon.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>But it’s her.</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <strong>
      <em>It’s Clarke.</em>
    </strong>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Even from a distance he can see her eyes fill with tears.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>She takes off her bag and hesitates for just a second before she breaks in for a run.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He’s opens up his arms and she throws herself in his embrace.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>As he holds her he thinks that he’s glad he listened to his mom and didn’t give up.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Turned out, there were waves worth crashing into you.</p>
</div>
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